The following comments must be read as being mine alone, in that
they have not been discussed by SACUA.

Most faculty members are already aware of the action taken by the
Regents of the University of California on July 20, 1995, in which they
voted to end affirmative action in admissions, hiring and the awarding
of contracts. Also, in early 1996, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th
Circuit ruled that the University of Texas may not consider race as a factor
in its Law School admissions policies. These two actions, when added to
the earlier ruling in the Bakke case, have focused a great deal of attention
on the status and future of affirmative action.

Following the "Hopwood" ruling some important statements were made
by the presidents of three major private universities, viz Rudenstine of
Harvard, Shapiro of Princeton and Casper of Stanford, each supporting strongly
the aims and objectives---and mostly, the methods and results---of affirmative
action programs over the past 30 years, at least as they applied to the
admissions policies of their universities.

It is interesting to reflect upon these statements and to ask why
these university presidents felt it necessary to affirm the value of something
that was being overruled in the courts, particularly since those edicts
do not apply to their private schools. As Casper expressed it: "As we look
for the leaders of tomorrow, if all we considered were capacities measurable
on a scale, without taking into consideration the aspects of `being deserving
and exceptional,' we would be betraying the Founders .... We do not admit
minorities to do them a favor. We want students from a variety of backgrounds
to help fulfill our educational responsibilities."

And Shapiro: "Since I believe it is essential to our common sense
of humanity, to the effective functioning of our democratic institutions
and to America's continued cultural and economic leadership that we achieve
as full a degree of participation as possible, I believe we should make
every effort to eliminate any social, cultural or economic impediments
to this goal (including gender, ethnic, religious and racial biases)."
And Rudenstine: "I do not believe we can solve the persistent dilemma of
race or ethnicity in American life simply by stating that we live---or
have a right to live---in a society where these characteristics have ceased
to be significant. Our hope for progress lies in gradually narrowing the
real gaps that continue to exist among many people of different races.
That can be done only by creating fruitful ways of bringing people together---at
the very best by educating them together."

The Michigan Mandate was instituted by President Duderstadt in 1988
but, apart from discussions with individual faculty members, it was never
presented to the Faculty Senate or to its representative body, the Senate
Assembly. I believe that it is time for us, the faculty, to confront the
issues which surround affirmative action and the Michigan Mandate and to
move, by consensus, to a faculty resolution as to the future of such initiatives.

Last April, the Senate Assembly passed a resolution affirming the
value of diversity in the makeup of the faculty and the University at large.
However, there was no advice as to how this desirable state might be achieved.
It seems appropriate that, particularly on the eve of a new University
presidency, this should now be attempted.

Earlier in the academic year, the Regents requested that the Provost
consult with each of the schools and colleges to ensure that their affirmative
action processes were within the law. He was able to reassure them on this
matter at the November 1996 meeting. Following closely upon this, the annual
minority faculty numbers were published in early January and these proclaimed
an increase of 0.3 percent (from 15.1 percent in 1995 to 15.4 percent in
1996) in total faculty numbers of 3,921. This represents an increase of
only 12 individuals in 1996 as well as showing a loss of five tenure track
and three lecturers from the African American faculty population alone,
yielding a total of 3.85 percent compared with a national average of about
11 percent. Our Native American faculty members also decreased, by 10 percent---from
10 to nine. Should these figures be a cause for concern? I believe that
they should, with regard to both recruitment and retention!

We can always find reasons why our recruitment of new faculty, minority
and non-minority, has taken the directions which it has, but it is vital
to remember that it is not the administration in which the Regents invest
the authority to select new faculty or promote them---it is the faculty,
and no initiatives for new faculty recruitment CAN succeed if the faculty
are not in agreement with them! Some critical questions then, surely are
these:

1. Should we, the faculty, be not only supportive but aggressive
in the recruitment and retention of underrepresented minority group members?

2. What do we, the faculty, AND the University and the nation at
large, stand to gain by bringing these individuals into the academic community?

Let me answer the second question first since I believe that it is
the crux of the matter.

It is profitable to reflect that, soon after the year 2000, the groups
that make up the minorities in the present population will become the majority
but, with our current rate of faculty recruitment, we will have progressed
less than half way towards such a composition of the faculty. Why should
this concern us?

Surely, one of the most important functions of education at all levels
is to open up the prospects of equal opportunity to every segment of the
population. In this regard, it is of paramount importance that the tertiary
educational system recognize its responsibilities for the preparation of
our future social, civic, business and educational leaders, and this, in
turn, requires a diverse professoriate. This has nothing to do with the
presence of role models! It is only the fact of their presence in significant
numbers that will be convincing proof of the absence of discrimination.

In recognizing the errors of the past we need to acknowledge that
many people were deprived of the opportunities they should have had to
partake fully of the social, economic and educational opportunities from
which the majority of people in this country have derived so much happiness,
profit and intellectual excitement. The problem, however, is to find ways
to remedy the problems that are with us now.

I have to admit that I was originally unconvinced that the civil
rights legislation of the 1960s could achieve the kinds of national attitudinal
changes concerning racial discrimination they were crafted to accomplish,
but I believe, in retrospect, that I had totally left out of my considerations
the importance of being required, as a departmental chair, for example,
to consider the possible legal consequences of my actions. The legislation
certainly had the effect of drawing my attention to the almost complete
absence of most minority groups in the faculty at that time.

It is helpful to reflect upon what might have happened had there
been no civil rights or affirmative action legislation. I am convinced
that although difficult problems remain, without those legislative actions,
this nation would have nothing like the degrees of social amity, economic
prosperity or educational equality which we have achieved. We have only
to observe the social upheavals stretching from African countries to the
Middle East and the Balkans, as well as the once powerful USSR to see the
results of past minority oppressions and their aspirations that have erupted
in the last five years and the directions they have taken. I believe that
there have been significant benefits from these civil rights and affirmative
action policies. However, we have a long way to go before minorities are
represented in numbers that reflect their abilities and their presence
in the community at large.

We have arrived at the first question that, of course, applies to
all significantly underrepresented minorities, not only African Americans
and Native Americans. It might be thought that a special case could be
made for these two groups in recognition of the errors of the past, but
my case does not rest upon this. Rather, it rests upon the present and
the future and not the past. The feature of the African American and Native
American groups that draws my special attention is due to the length of
time we have had to secure their full inclusion, and how much still remains
to be accomplished.

It is too early to guess where the current legal issues on affirmative
action will end so I will not attempt to foresee them. I believe that,
particularly for higher education, the legal position should be unimportant
and that the basic attitudes expressed by Presidents Casper, Shapiro and
Rudenstine should be sufficient for us to seriously attack this imbalance
in the makeup of our faculties and our student population.

The Senate Assembly has already affirmed the desirability for a diversity
of our faculty and our university generally but no consensus emerged during
the discussions as to how to proceed. Reading many of the articles written
on affirmative action by business and social leaders, as well as higher
education, one consistently notes their concern for a leadership pattern
which is inclusive of all groups---religious, ethnic, racial, gender and
so on. I feel sure that this is a very important factor in the attitudes
of many of the university presidents in their support of affirmative action,
viz---that they are very aware of the changing demographics and they are
determined that their universities will continue to have those leaders
among their alumni and alumnae. We, in our turn, can hardly do less!

The issue, then, is that nearly everyone avows the importance of
diversity in higher educational faculty, but there are objections from
some faculty and some legal rulings against race as a valid basis for affirmative
action. However, I do not think that anyone has ever suggested affirmative
action based purely upon racial origin but rather, that merit is not a
strictly or simply quantifiable characteristic.

As a faculty, we are concerned with the selection, retention and
promotion of future and current faculty members. In selecting new faculty
we actually base our decisions on many factors. Within every department
there are usually many different fields and even within these fields there
are choices as to which areas are likely to be most fruitful in the future.
Also, to be frank, we now often weigh in heavily in terms of areas described
as "fundable" with all of the ambiguities inherent in the values involved.

With all these choices available, we often hire candidates on the
basis of a string of assumptions that are not always based upon their individually
demonstrated abilities but, rather, on a set of criteria which are often
seated in political values more than academic attainment. To be sure, there
are cases of such exceptional demonstrated academic abilities that a singular,
opportunistic appointment can be achieved, but these represent a small
percentage of new appointments, especially at the beginning level. Again,
there are certainly cases where the pool is void of minority candidates,
but then this may well be a "Catch 22" matter that only time can erase.

What, then, am I advocating with respect to minority recruitment?
It is that we must do our best to define our future academic needs in terms
that are far broader than we have hitherto been inclined to do, and to
recognize, a priori, that the decisions we make DO involve complex social,
political and academic motives. The more specialized---or over-specialized---our
constraints become, the more unlikely it is that we will attract a diverse
group of candidates who will be able to present their own views of the
future of the subject. In the broader circumstances I believe that we,
the faculty, will be far more open to the nature of the decisions we are
making and be more likely to recognize the value of perspectives that minority
candidates can bring to the educational profession.

In these terms "affirmative action" represents a state of awareness
of the total climate in which our recruitment and promotion decisions are
made, rather than viewing them in the more limited dimensionality of our
perceived individual subspeciality mandates and their current fundability.

Let us, then, as the people who are invested with the authority to
recruit and promote our future and present colleagues, exercise this great
responsibility by broadening our understanding of what we are doing every
time we engage in this process and strive to enhance our faculty diversity.
Only by increasing representation of the widest racial, ethnic, religious,
political and gender representatives will we find the kind of unity which
all those differences ultimately make possible.